…Ingredients for vicarious living

1. Keep your options open. If you decide something, that instantly means you have to do something.  And if you have to do something, you don’t get to be a spectator.  So ignore any twinges of inspiration, forget about having a timetable, and stay in those PJs.  Don’t let life get in the way of your doing nothing.

2. Unlimited supply. Line your every surface with stimuli – books, DVDs, music, games – so you don’t have to actually do anything in order to feel everything.  Any kind of adventure or fulfilment you could ever want is right at your fingertips.  Sure, your skin may go translucent from lack of natural light, and your torso may adopt a spherical shape, but those people in that frame/on that page/in that song are doing more than enough attractiveness for you.

3. Cloak of invisibility. If you’re too noticable in real life, you’ll be too busy being you and won’t have time to experience life through fictional characters.  But if you’re invisible – like a ninja or… someone who’s invisible – you’re free to live life to the emptiest.  Free as a dodo or a pterodactyl.

Script Frenzy has ended.  I reached an admirable 85 pages.

I was going to submit a less-than-admirable 100, but when I got to the website to upload my doctored document, I found the uploading feature closed.  It was set to American-centric time and clocked off, probably, at midnight on Pacific Daylight Savings Time – about 7 hours ago.

But my aim was to see a thing through, and I did.  I wrote three TV episodes, plus the beginnings of a musical.  Little of this is good work, but I never pledged to write well – just to write.  And write I did, until life got in the way (which I’m kind of grateful for, truth be told – as I’ve said before, “Ah life – it’s a keeper”).

So why would I go and cheat and add some stuff I’d written prior to April in order to give myself a 100 page document to submit?  How cheap is that?!  Sucked in to me for stuffing up the deadline and missing out on an ill-got whole number.  For shame!

I wouldn’t cheat in a game against anyone else – if I ever get the chance to peek at cards or short change Monopoly money, I can’t keep a lid on myself for longer than a minute.  In a spirit of guilt or giggling, I cannot shut my mouth. 

I’ve been told before I’m a crap liar and I’m inclined to agree.  On the other hand, one of my high school teachers once told me I was “either very unfortunate or a damn good liar” when I’d come up with yet another excuse for why I hadn’t done my homework.  Though, the fact that she pointed out how “good” a liar I - allegedly - was, pretty much spells the opposite.

Anyway, my point - buried in an entanglement of tangents here – is, I’m prepared to cheat myself way above and beyond my preparedness to cheat others.  This is comforting in a way – also, unsettling.

Still.  85 pages.   That’s about as much script than I’ve written in the entire last six years.  So in that sense, I didn’t short-change anyone, or anything – not even myself.

I may have cheated this blog though.  So I guess my new pledge is to give it some TLC. 

“Don’t go chasin’ waterfalls, please stick to the rivers and the lakes that you’re used to…”

Hey, if I’m gonna short-change this blog, I may as well screw it up good ‘n’ proper before I make amends.

Er, sorry.